Entertainment

‘Marvel Universe’ Co-Creator Stan Lee Dead at 95

11/15/2018 7:31:26 PM

By Lindsey Bahr
LOS ANGELES (AP)—Stan Lee, the creative dynamo who, along with artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, revolutionized the comic book and helped make billions for Hollywood by introducing human frailties in superheroes such as Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four and the Incredible Hulk, died Monday. He was 95.
Lee was declared dead at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, according to Kirk Schenck, an attorney for Lee's daughter, J.C. Lee.
As the top writer at Marvel Comics and later as its publisher, Lee was widely considered the architect of...

By Jake Coyle
NEW YORK (AP)—More than 46 years after it was shot, the Aretha Franklin concert film “Amazing Grace” will finally be released, ending one of the most tortured and long-running sagas in documentary film.
The late gospel singer's estate and film producers said Monday that “Amazing Grace” will premiere Nov. 12 at the DOC NYC film festival with the full support of Franklin's estate. The film, largely shot by Sydney Pollack, captures Franklin's performance at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in...

NEW YORK (AP)—Aerosmith guitarist Joe Perry has been hospitalized with breathing problems that began after a guest performance with Billy Joel in New York.
Perry's publicists said in a statement Sunday that the musician is alert and responsive in the hospital and is expected to return to the road later this month.
The statement says Perry felt short of breath after the performance at Madison Square Garden. It adds paramedics backstage gave Perry oxygen and used a tracheal tube to clear his airway before taking him to the hospital.
Perry had to cancel a Sunday...

By Stacy M. Brown
In about three minutes, singer Alicia Keys captured the very essence of the late pop megastar, Prince.
Now, over the course of nearly two or more hours, famed movie maker Ava DuVernay will capture the “Purple Rain” hitmaker’s life and career on film. DuVernay confirmed that she’s been tapped to direct a new documentary on the icon, who died in 2016 at the age of 57.
“Prince was a genius, a joy and a jolt to the senses. He was like no other,” DuVernay wrote in a Tweet confirming that she’s working on the...

Rihanna and Axl Rose to Donald Trump: Stop Playing Our Music at Your Rallies

11/8/2018 2:14:30 PM

By Lauren Victoria Burke
When a popular singer with 88 million followers on her twitter account sends a message about something bothering her, people tend to notice. When she sends the message less than 72 hours before a crucial midterm election they notice even more.
President Trump’s constant use of popular music from artists who do not support him continues. Artists from Paul McCartney to Bruce Springsteen to Steven Tyler have publicly asked for Trump to stop playing their music during the 2016 campaign. Prince’s estate has done the same. In likely...

By Andrew Dalton
LOS ANGELES (AP)—Trumpeter Roy Hargrove, a prolific player who provided his jazz sound to records across a vast range of styles and won two Grammys, has died at age 49, his manager said Saturday.
Hargrove died in New York on Friday of cardiac arrest stemming from a longtime fight with kidney disease, longtime manager Larry Clothier said in a statement.
Clothier said Hargrove “was known just as intensely for his brimming fire and fury as he was for his gorgeous, signature balladry. Over and over, his sound attested to and sanctified his...

By Lauren Victoria Burke
Pioneering poet and playwright Ntozake Shange died on the morning of October 27 at an assisted living facility in Bowie, Maryland. She was best known for her much celebrated Obie Award-winning play, “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf.”
“To our extended family and friends, it is with sorrow that we inform you that our loved one, Ntozake Shange, passed away peacefully in her sleep in the early morning of October 27, 2018. Memorial information / details will follow at a later date,” her...

By Staff Reports
LOS ANGELES (AP)—Eva Longoria and Gina Rodriguez will be among those honored at next month's ALMA awards.
Wilmer Valderrama is host of the celebration of Latino achievements in American entertainment and media.
Activists Samantha Fuentes and Jamie Margolin also will be honored. Fuentes survived the Parkland, Florida, school shooting, and Margolin founded the Zero Hour movement to address climate change.
Rodriguez, star of TV's “Jane the Virgin,” will share the awards spotlight with the show's cast.
The Nov. 4...

Yara Shahidi brought the crowd to its feet at the GLSEN Respect Awards as she warned against an "identity blind narrative" in the struggle for acceptance of all.
"We should all feel deserved and supported in expressing our right to being our whole selves, limited by nothing regardless of ethnicity, gender, identity, sexuality, ability, religion or any other identity that we choose," the 18-year-old "grown-ish" actress said Friday at a ceremony in Beverly Hills, California. "More than that, the common spaces we must maneuver through should be safe...

WASHINGTON–Production of ABC’s The Rookie brought much more than lights, cameras, and action to several California communities. The new drama series, which debuted this week, injected more than $65 million into the state economy, providing jobs and economic opportunity to men and women in the television industry, as well as local businesses.
Filming over the course of 64 days, in locations from Los Angeles City Hall to historic downtown Oxnard, The Rookie employed more than 1,500 crew members and almost 3,000 extras.
“California is more than just our home...